Building your company’s buyer personas is the first and most important step when starting an Inbound Marketing Campaign. It is so foundational because it is setting the stage for who you are trying to reach. Without a solid understanding of who your buyer is, there will be no way for you to plan, implement, and thrive from an Inbound Marketing Campaign.

With that being said, here are 7 things you need to know before you build your B2B buyer personas:

1. Are they brand advocates?

Is this person an advocate for your brand, product, or service? Essentially, an advocate is a person that is going to be excited and rooting for your solution and present it in a positive light to key decision makers. It is wise to target advocate personas with your campaign so that they have the information necessary to represent your solutions to the decision-makers in your organization. A clear understanding of the organization’s structure and role will be necessary to pull this off.

2. What is their company role?

Before you start building your Buyer Personas, you need to understand what your persona’s role is. There is a good chance that you will be dealing with multiple people in an organization. From key decision makers in the C-Suite to an advocate in the marketing/sales department, you will need to understand all of your persona roles so that you know what types of content, challenges, and solutions that you will be working with. This is critical to the success of your campaign.

3. How does your persona define success?

It is important to know how your b2b buyer personas define success so that you will understand your client’s goals thoroughly. This will help you delight your persona and keep them excited and engaged with your brand. Also, by providing content that is built around the challenges that your personas go through and their personal success, your campaigns will be more successful.

4. What challenges do your personas deal with?

Creating campaigns around your persona’s biggest challenges is crucial to being successful in Inbound Marketing. A good way to do this is by presenting solutions and educating your persona on how people/organizations with similar challenges solved them. You can do this through case studies in the middle of the funnel. This will also help with your lead nurturing workflows to present helpful and relevant content to potential clients to hopefully convert them into advocates for your solutions.

5. Where do your personas like to hang out online?

Understanding where your personas spend their time online is important because it gives you a deeper insight into what kind of content they like to consume, as well as how and where to distribute it. Get to know the content that they are already engaging with and you will be able to create content that is familiar to them that they will want to read, share, and engage with.

6. What topics or content will be relatable with your personas?

A phrase that has become super prevalent in the marketing community is “Content is King.” This is especially true when trying to be relatable with potential clients. Without a solid understanding of what topics and content will relate to your persona’s challenges, you are setting your campaign up for failure. You need to learn what messages will relate with their challenges and offer helpful solutions that will address their issues and get them excited about your brand.

7. How do they interact with your brand (phone, email, etc.)

Eventually, your personas will become leads and it is crucial that you know how to nurture them in the most effective way possible. If they receive hundreds of emails daily, an email campaign may not be the best way to follow up with them. Sales may have to respond with a quick follow up phone call instead. The possibilities are vast, but as you get to know your customers, you’ll have a deeper understanding of your b2b buyer personas’ challenges and behaviors. Knowing how to follow up with your personas will be paramount to optimizing your lead nurturing campaign and increase the amount of SQLs (sales qualified leads) generated by your campaigns.